How to contact siblings

holly_johnson

Hey there, a former mod of this forum asking for advice. I’ve struggled with this for a long time.

I searched, found & met my *natural* mother when I turned 18 & it was a bit mad. We continued to meet sporadically for a few years until my wedding day in 1998 where she went to the church & then vanished & no contact since. It’s something that makes me very sad.

Anyhoo the reason for my question is that she has two kids - 1 boy & 1 girl, who are both at least in their 30’s now. When I asked to meet them she went berko so I left it. But so much time has passed with no contact despite me sending her a letter & xmas card every year.

Do her kids deserve to know about me? Am I wrong to desperately want to meet them & have a “family”?

I’m so messed up.

Hermy

No, you're not wrong to want to meet with them.

And life's to short - talk to them.

Particularly if they're grown-ups themselves then it's for them to decide if they want contact with you.

If you have a contact address I'd suggest a well worded letter.

holly_johnson

Hermy wrote: »

No, you're not wrong to want to meet with them.

And life's to short - talk to them.

Particularly if they're grow-ups themselves then it's for them to decide if they want contact with you.

If you have a contact address I'd suggest a well worded letter.

I have no contact address other than the last address I know my “mother” lived in. So what do you think I should say? I really don’t want to “wreck” the life they’ve had & believed to be true. I guess there’s a lot of me that still feels like a dirty secret & there I should stay...

Hermy

Tell them the truth - that you're adopted, that you believe that they are your [half] siblings, that you are making contact with them because you'd like to get to know them, and that you hope that they might like to get to know you too.
Tell them too that you've had contact with your birth mum which has helped you a lot in your journey and that you hope that making contact with them will help you even more.
Obviously you'll word it as nicely as you can but I wouldn't try to say much more than that in an initial contact letter.

With adoption so much in the public eye just now for various reasons, good and bad, I'd be very doubtful that your making contact is going to wreck their lives. Most people are reasonable and fair and they may be just as curious about you as you are about them.

Given that, as you say she went "berko", perhaps posting a letter to them at her address might not be ideal.
Have you tried looking for them on Facebook?

holly_johnson

Thanks for the advice. Lots more thinking to do.

kathy finn

Hi Holly,
I would do a search through GRO and find addresses for both but before you write to them i would write to birth mum and tell her you are making contact with your siblings.
They are both adults and can make the choice if they want contact or not
Good Luck

holly_johnson

Thanks Kathy. I think that I need to think about this some more, at least until I can be less emotional. Nothing good comes from emotional decisions imo.

Hermy

holly_johnson wrote: »

...I think that I need to think about this some more, at least until I can be less emotional...

I often found this worked for me too - to wait a while before I take the next step.

LightlyGo

holly_johnson wrote: »

Hey there, a former mod of this forum asking for advice. I’ve struggled with this for a long time.

I searched, found & met my *natural* mother when I turned 18 & it was a bit mad. We continued to meet sporadically for a few years until my wedding day in 1998 where she went to the church & then vanished & no contact since. It’s something that makes me very sad.

Anyhoo the reason for my question is that she has two kids - 1 boy & 1 girl, who are both at least in their 30’s now. When I asked to meet them she went berko so I left it. But so much time has passed with no contact despite me sending her a letter & xmas card every year.

Do her kids deserve to know about me? Am I wrong to desperately want to meet them & have a “family”?

I’m so messed up.

I think you don't need to consider their right to know you. You have a right to reach out and find them if you wish.
I recently had a half brother I never knew about contact me via facebook. It was definitely a shock but I was really happy, even delighted to hear from him. The one thing that I found hard to understand was that his approach was "I'm doing this because you have a right to know". That took me aback a bit. I would have much rathered if he'd said he'd done it because he'd like to get to know me, or he felt he had a right to know me. "You have a right to know" straight out of the blue from a stranger made me a little unsure of his motivation in getting in touch, it felt a little more aggressive than friendly.
It was a small issue though. I was delighted and excited to hear he existed. I hope he'll want to connect fully and be "family". That's definitely what I want.

goat2

If someone were to contact me claiming to be my half sister, brother, niece or nephew, yes I would speak to them, have the blood works done and go from there, I would welcome them into the fold and let the rest of the family know about them, no doubt about that